Morbid and Creepifyin'
by AGriffinWriter
Summary: What Mal didn't know when he let William "Spike" Pratt and Drusilla Keeble on board Serenity is that the out-of-work renaissance man and his half-mad girlfriend are vampires! Thankfully, there's a Slayer aboard the vessel as well. Canon Firefly parings. Post "Objects in Space". BtVS Season 2-ish Spike/Dru. *On temporary hiatus*
1. Chapter 1: Passage

_A/N: Welcome to 'Morbid and Creepifyin', my Firefly/Buffy cross-over. This takes place in a slightly AU 'Verse... basically the only difference is the presence of Buffyverse demons (vampires, vengeance demons, maybe even some of the loose-skinned Clem variety...). All Firefly crew members are present (i.e. Book, Inara, and Tam siblings are still permanent crew, pre-Serenity film, ignores any events of the comics). Our favorite punk vampire couple are their season 2 embodiments: Dru is recently weakened, à la mob, and Spike is in full Big Bad regalia, the lover and the fighter. This story will occasionally take quotes from BtVS Season 2 and Firefly/Serenity. Enjoy and please review!_

* * *

Chapter 1: Passage

"We ready to push off?" Mal calls through the heavy rain. He stands on the gangplank of _Serenity_, hollering at Wash and Jayne as they lash the last of their fresh supplies in the cargo hold.

"Reckon so, Capt'n!" Jayne shouts back. "Unless this _gorram_ rain is too heavy for liftoff."

"We'll be fine," Wash shrugs, easy-going as always. "What could go wrong?"

"You know you done jinxed us, you nitwit," glowers Jayne, already stomping towards the common area. "Go shake some salt or some such."

"Since when did you get all superstitious?" Wash chuckles, joining him.

Alone in the cargo bay, Mal stomps up the ramp and takes shelter inside. One after another, he pulls off his boots and pours out the collected rainwater, ready for a hot meal – straight protein, what else? – and a fresh change of clothes.

"Oi, there... half a moment, sir. You the captain what put out an advertisement?"

Mal turns at the accented voice and sees a thin young man with startlingly blond hair waiting at the edge of the pier. He's cloaked in a black leather duster and has one arm around a dainty-looking, dark haired woman, whose face is hidden against the man's shoulder.

"That'd be me," Mal replies curiously. "Captain Malcolm Reynolds. This here is _Serenity_."

The blond man's eyes flicker to the rain-blurred outline of _Serenity_, and he nods admiringly, earning another small fraction of Mal's attention.

"Lovely ship. _Firefly_ class, am I right?"

"That's so. You ever sailed on a _Firefly_ before, boy?"

"Can't say as I have, but lookin' to. Are you takin' on passengers? Me and my bird can't pay much, but we're nice folk. Make no trouble."

Mal looks the young man up and down, but in the pouring rain the only feature that continues to stand out is his eerily blond hair, slicked back from his forehead.

"Maybe," says Mal. "Depends on a few things. That hair of yorn in't radioactive now, ain't it?"

The man's brows narrow in irritation, and the woman he's supporting giggles slightly.

"No, sir," he mutters. "Touch of bleach every couple weeks. My girl here likes it."

"Understandable. Men can do awful funny things for their women."

A wicked smile appears on the man's lips. "Couldn't agree more, Captain Reynolds."

"What'd be your name now, boy?"

"Will Pratt. I'm a freelance writer an' artist. Bit down on my luck of late."

"He's Spike, Mal."

River floats ethereally out of the cargo hold and stands next to Mal, her eyes riveted to the two strangers at the bottom of the gangplank.

"Come again, girly?" asks Mal, confused.

"Spike," she repeats. "Bloody William."

Still staring at Will, she raises her pointer fingers to her mouth and draws little lines from her upper lip to her chin, but Mal doesn't understand her gesture.

"The word 'spike' mean anything to you, boy?" he inquires, brows raised.

"Can't say it does, sir," he replies, watching River sway from foot to foot at Mal's side.

"Spike, the fairy girl plays in my head," coos the woman on his arm, too quietly for Mal and River to hear. "She dances and prances, throwing flowers that turn into stars . . ."

"Easy, pet," Spike murmurs in her ear. "When we're aboard the nice boat, you can have nummy treats to eat again. Just stay quiet for now."

"Your lady-friend's not ill, is she, Mr. Pratt?" asks Mal loudly. "Don't want no diseases aboard my ship."

"No, Cap'n, my Dru's just a weak little thing. Always has trouble adjustin' from planet to planet. Space works wonders on her."

He bestows a little kiss on Dru's dark hair, and she titters softly, sliding her hand in a sensuous circle over his stomach.

"Well, uh... what'd you have in mind?" asks Mal, mentally inventorying the spare rooms left in _Serenity_. "Got a passenger cabin vacant, or a shuttle if you shell out a bit more dough, n'case you have a hankering to go planet-side on occasion. What _can_ you pay?"

"What's your askin' price on the passenger cabin, sir?"

Mal shrugs. "Three hundred a month. But I'm a reasonable man..."

To his surprise, the blond stranger doesn't even wince at the suggested rate, but instantly rifles through an inner pocket of his duster and unearths a handful of crumpled Alliance credits. In doing so, Mal gets enough of a glance at the man's torso to see he's got no weapon strapped to his hip.

"I can put up enough quid for three months' down-payment," says Will, taking his first full step onto _Serenity_'s loading ramp, the woman at his side, her playing hands barely keeping to decent places.

"That there's a mighty fine offer, boy," Mal replies, crossing his arms. Not even an attempt to bargain the price down... either the professed writer is a gen-u-ine tenderfoot – a real dandy like Simon – or he's got the best poker face in the 'Verse and something right unseemly he's hiding.

"Like I said, Captain, love seein' what space does to my girl," Will shrugs, arm tightly wrapped around the frail but smiling woman.

"Just like that?" inquires Mal, hands still folded cautiously. "No caveats and addendums?"

"Only askin' for privacy... peace an' quiet... an' that we'll be excused from crew meals and such."

"Reasonable requests, I reckon. Got any luggage needs loading?"

"No, sir, just this carpet bag 'tween the two of us."

"Well, then," Mal nods, extending his hand to Will, "welcome aboard the _Serenity_."

Will returns the gesture, firmly grasping Mal's. Hmm. Cold fingers. Maybe it's the rain.


	2. Chapter 2: Starstruck

_A/N: In response to the anonymous question (thank you so much for your review!): In this AU 'Verse, Spike and Dru are slightly 'younger' but roughly the same age as when they show up in Buffy Season 2. Spike hasn't yet attained the full self-confidence that he possesses by 'School Hard'. This Spike will initially be more like the Spike/William in the flashback scenes of Angel Season 5, like Spike before he killed his first Slayer and really came into his own power. But rest assured, the Big Bad is in there, waiting for his chance._

_Also realized from looking at some "official" blueprints of _Serenity_ that there are probably multiple free passenger rooms. Ah, well._

_This story will occasionally take quotes from Buffy/Angel, and Firefly/Serenity. Enjoy and please review!_

* * *

Chapter 2: Starstruck

As Mal steps aside to let Will and his woman slip through the cargo bay door, River scampers away and clatters up the stairs to the balcony walkway. Her dark eyes are huge, staring down at the two pale passengers while the rest of the crew – save Wash – enter the bay from the common area.

"Didn't know we were taking on passengers," snorts Jayne to Zoe, who just shrugs.

"Everyone," announces the captain, "this here is Will Pratt and . . . um . . ."

"Drusilla," Spike informs him.

"Right, Will and Drusilla," Mal continues, still addressing the crew. "They're joining up with us for a spell, assuming they don't get tired of us before liftoff."

Grinning, he strolls to the control board and punches the button for the intercom. "Wash, we ready for liftoff?"

-"_We surely are, Captain_."-

"We're all sealed up down here. Get us in the air."

-"_Right_."-

Standing behind Kaylee and Zoe, Simon gazes fixedly at Spike, as though trying to remember something, an elusive memory plaguing him.

"Anyhow," says Captain Reynolds, clomping back over to where the new residents of _Serenity_ stand and pointing out the crew by name one by one. "This is Zoe, my first mate, married to our fine pilot, Wash... Kaylee, the ship's mechanic... Shepherd Book... Jayne... Inara... and... _Shaw_, our doctor."

Simon flinches slightly and mouths "_Shaw?_" at Mal the second the two passengers' eyes are elsewhere occupied. Mal just gives him a helpless shrug.

"She okay?" asks Kaylee kindly with a look at Drusilla, who cocks her head, grinning hauntedly.

"Sometimes she feels a mite weaker planet-side," William answers, smiling at the mechanic. "Loves bein' out among the stars. Day or so, be right as rain."

"Oh, River loves the stars too. And me. The stars, I mean. I love the stars... too."

Kaylee drops her gaze from the entrancing blue eyes of the blond man and stares at a nearby stack of supply crates.

"Yeah, them stars are real purty. Big balls of flaming hot gas fit to melt your hull if you swing too close," Jayne scoffs as he and Shepherd Book head for the exercise equipment at the side of the cargo bay.

"You truly missed your calling as a poet," chuckles the preacher.

"My Will is a poet," murmurs the raven-haired woman in a breathy whisper, and all heads turn in her direction. "He plucks words up from the ground like flowers."

She suddenly frowns, eyes losing focus. "William... I'm cold."

His reaction is immediate – shrugging his duster from his shoulders, turning away a moment to shake the raindrops clear, and then enfolding Drusilla in its warmth.

"I got you, baby," he croons sweetly.

Smiling again, she lifts a hand to his face and touches one pointed nail to his cheek, but he cups her fingers quickly, drawing them to his shoulder. "Not now, sweets. Later. Alone..."

He leans forward to kiss her, a caress that rapidly becomes far too intimate for the present audience. Both Inara and Zoe raise their eyebrows, and Kaylee's eyes are as big as the glass portholes between the ship's sections. Mal clears his throat loudly.

"Well, uh... Kaylee, why don't you show our guests to their cabin? Kaylee?" he repeats when the young engineer continues staring speechlessly at the embracing couple. Her stupor doesn't lift until William and Drusilla's mouths separate, and then she glances quickly up at Mal.

"You say somethin'?"

"Yes," he replies, rolling his eyes. "How 'bout you give Will and Drusilla the short-ish tour up to their cabin? Put 'em up in the larger one 'cross from the doc."

"Oh! Sure thing, Cap'n!"

Blushing, she tucks her hair behind her ears and walks quickly toward the hallway between the infirmary and the common area. Spike counts out the agreed-upon number of Alliance bills from his pocket and hands them to Mal with a respectful nod before hefting the carpetbag more securely in his fist and slipping his arm back around Drusilla. He draws her along with him, following Kaylee.

"This here's the common room, comfy place to sit and talk," she announces amiably. "Infirmary on the left... Kitchen and dining room right up those stairs... here we go!"

She slides open the partition door to one of the vacant cabin rooms. "Need anything, just give a holler."

"Thank you, Kaylee," Spike murmurs, smiling with just a hint of the wolfish grin he's capable of showing. Kaylee blushes again.

"Weren't nothin'. Always fun to have new folks on board. Keeps us on our toes."

"I... think we'd like to be alone now," he says softly, his long-lashed lids fluttering as he kisses Drusilla's hair and turns Kaylee's face even pinker.

"Right! Course! Got... got kissin' to do..."

Now radish-colored, she whisks away, and Spike immediately sweeps Drusilla inside the private room, glides the door closed, and flips the lock.

"Will you devour me now, my princess?"

Drusilla grins gleefully at his lust-laden words and rakes her fingers down his red dress shirt. Her eyes seem to glow and slowly transform from navy blue into fierce gold, and with a _crunch_ her forehead turns ridged and inhuman. Smiling widely enough to show the razor-sharp fangs that have replaced her incisors, she stands on tiptoe, draws Spike's collar away from his throat, and bites down with a amorous sigh, teeth piercing into his white skin.

"Drink deep, baby," Spike whispers plaintively, hands slipping his leather coat off his lover's shoulders and letting it fall to the floor. His arms slink around her waist, pulling her body tight to his, and his eyes close as she draws on his blood. She shimmies slightly as she swallows, and he rubs his knuckles between her shoulders, caressing her upper back.

"I want her, the littlish girl, who makes the ship dance," Drusilla entreats him, her fangs momentarily emerging from his flesh. "Get her for me, my pretty Spike..."

"I'll get her, precious, make her your special treat..."

"That's my darling boy. My darling, deadly boy..."

She gyrates more strongly against him, her fingers working their way under the hem of his black t-shirt as she lowers her mouth to his neck again and sinks her fangs into the wound that had already begun to heal.

* * *

_To be continued..._


	3. Chapter 3: Likeness

_A/N: Thank you _ChetUnGwan, MissDigikitty_, and _Molly Bergstrom_ for reviewing this short fun piece of mine. _CailinRua_, I hope you give it a try! This chapter is a bit longer than the previous ones, and is mostly the Firefly crew._

_This story will occasionally take quotes from Buffy/Angel, and Firefly/Serenity. Enjoy and please review!_

* * *

Chapter 3: Likeness

**_Meanwhile, back in the cargo bay_****...**

"What?" demands Mal as the angry young doctor stomps toward him.

"_Shaw_?" Simon blurts out frustratedly. "I have to pretend my name is _Shaw_?"

"What's wrong with it? Decent name!"

"Knew a fellar named Shaw one time," recalls Jayne, curling a dumbbell and only partially paying attention. "I think I shot him."

"You shoot everybody, Jayne," Zoe points out.

"Ain't never shot you!"

"Threatened to a'plenty."

"Captain," interrupts Simon desperately. "I must speak with you, preferably in private."

"What is it now, Doc?" Mal demands as Kaylee reenters the cargo hold, her face flushed ruby red. "You got something to say, say it."

Simon glances up at River, who's tiptoeing around on one of the raised walkways, choreographing some kind of graceful dance. She's the strongest motivation in the 'verse, one that could drive a loving brother to do the unthinkable – break into a high-security Alliance detention facility, rescue her from psychotic researchers, and smuggle her on board a ship headed for who knew where. Every since the run-in with Jubal Early, Simon has watched his sister with particular care, and she seems the most lucid she's been in recent memory... until today, when the sight of the newest residents of _Serenity_ somehow set her off, made her retreat into her own head.

Setting his gaze back on the captain, Simon shrugs and labors to put his unease into words. "It's... about our guests. They... I don't know... I've got this feeling, and so does River. I can just tell."

"Seem alright to me," shrugs Kaylee shyly. "And they ain't so fixated on what's _appropriate_ as some folk 'round here."

Simon heaves a sigh, but before he can speak, Jayne stands up and hustles over, nodding vigorously.

"Hate to admit it, Capt'n, but I have to stand with Doc here. He's right. Something don't sit right with them folk. Too purty."

"Jealous?" Inara teases.

"Darn right, I'm jealous! But that ain't the point. Did'ya hear the gibberish that woman was spoutin'? We already got one whirly-brained wisp of a girl on board. I say, any more and we'll all go sideways."

Mal leans back against a crate, arms crossed over his chest. A captain couldn't ask for better guests than the two pale strangers he'd permitted on board – two quiet, low-maintenance civilians who pay cold hard cash up front, like their privacy, and are so busy being head-over-heels smitten with each other that they won't do anything to break up his little family. Already enough trouble on that front, with Inara barely speaking to him, the tense question of baby-making between Zoe and Wash, and then little Kaylee and the Doc stuck in this puppy-love gridlock that's bound to make the rest of the crew go all kinds of crazy until those two finally admit their attraction to each other. But the problems of _Serenity_'s rag-tag core crew aren't the present issue. He let William Pratt and Drusilla on board, and so now he had to back up his decision.

"Well," Mal finally addresses the group, "I'm not denying that those two are a little hair-raisin', but I've a hefty amount of cred in my pocket tellin' me I don't mind so much. In my ledger, a payin' passenger is a good passenger."

"N'less they turn out to be wanted fugitives, on the run from the _gorram _Alliance," remarks Jayne with a pointed glare at Simon.

"Captain," the doctor sighs, running a hand over his chocolate hair, "there's... there's more. Maybe I'm wrong, but... I think I recognize that man."

The atmosphere in the cargo bay sobers considerably. Mal and Zoe's right hands drop instinctively to their hips, checking the status of their pistols, while Inara and Kaylee give identical gasps of surprise. Book sits up from the workout bench, brow narrowed and clearly listening intently. Jayne, however, chuckles with derision.

"What, med school dropout or sum'mit? The boy looks like he'd faint clear away at the sight of a little blood, then again I'd a' never figured _you_ for a tough-stomached doctor, an' hell, you've surprised me a number a' times. Now don't let that go to your head," he reprimands. "Already swelled up enough as is, what with little Kaylee flirtin' all over ya."

"Hey!" Kaylee protests, her face finally on its way back to its usual color. "Simon's head ain't swollen. Don't be such a _húndàn_."

"I'm still strugglin' over the idea that you think you've seen those folks before, in a galaxy this size," Zoe tries to shift the attention back to Simon's surprising comment. "Don't seem like the type of folk you would have shared company with in the Core. They looked real soft, and greener than any labor-roughened settlers, but definitely not your echelon, Doc."

"I never said they were," Simon clarifies. "And it's only the man I remember, William Pratt. My father commissioned him to paint a portrait of my mother for a charity fundraiser he held. The cause was a mockery of course – just a boasting contest, plastering the title of generosity on whoever would dig deepest into their infinite purses – but I remember the finished portrait. It was her exact likeness, down to her freckles and the smile lines around her eyes. Father hated it, of course, wanted something to play up Mother's beauty, glamorize her."

Jayne clears his throat in boredom, cutting in on Simon's reflection.

"My point is, Captain, I don't think that man can be trusted."

"An' this is just 'cuz he singled out your dear ol' mother's age spots, is it?" jeers Jayne.

"I just don't think he is who he says," shrugs Simon. "An artist with talent like his, if recognized by someone less vain than my father, could have had a position in the highest circles on Ariel or another central planet, not skirting the outer rim with no idea where he'll spend the next month or the next night."

"In all seriousness, Doc, do you think he might recognize you two?" Mal demands. The only concerning point he's gleaned from Simon's story is the potential threat to himself, his crew – including the Tam siblings – and his ship. The warrants on Simon and River, dead or alive, are still heavily circulated over the waves.

"I doubt it," replies Simon pointedly. "I was _eight_ at the time. River wasn't even walking yet."

"Poor boy must've had to work for a living from a mighty young age, then," Zoe remarks sympathetically, glancing back toward the passenger cabins. "That man can't be more than twenty-eight... maybe thirty, if he's aging well."

"I should certainly say he's aging well... because he looked exactly the same fifteen years ago when he worked for my father," says Simon, finally reaching the crux of his hesitancy in sharing room and board with William.

After a beat of heavy silence, Jayne breaks it with a laugh. "Aw, now you're just foolin'. Ain't no way that's the same man you 'member."

"And just how many young men have you ever met with blond hair like that?" queries Simon, almost daring Jayne to refute him. "A little hard to forget."

"His hair is white. He is very old," River hums down to them, still prancing delicately and gracefully across the walkway between the two shuttles.

Simon turns back to Mal, eyes placating. "Captain, I know what I remember. William Pratt, a humble artist just looking for work... or so it seemed. We can't trust him."

"What do you expect us to do, Doc? Set a guard on our passengers?" demands Zoe.

"For a start."

"Whatever happened to 'innocent before proven guilty'?" Inara asks sharply.

"I'd rather live by the sayin', 'shoot 'em before they shoot you'," mumbles Jayne. He flips out his hefty buck knife and hawks up some spit onto the blade, rubbing it with a small leather cloth so that it shines.

"That eye-for-an-eye mentality leads to a whole 'verse full of blind people," Shepherd Book comments.

"Enough!" Mal orders. "So far as I'm concerned, them folk ain't done nothin' wrong 'cept look like somebody you saw fifteen years ago, an' that ain't enough for me to refuse them the same welcome I extended to you when you came aboard."

"You punched me in the face and threatened to hand my sister over to the Alliance, after insinuating that I was a pedophile," replies Simon, eyebrows raised.

"Good times," mutters Jayne, still cleaning his blade and letting out audible spitting sounds.

"Well... be that as it may," Mal continues, a bit apologetic, "Will and Drusilla are under my care as Captain, an' I don't want no harm comin' to them. You all hear me clear, now?"

"Crystal clear," Kaylee answers emphatically, while Jayne just _harrumphs_ in response.

"Just tell me where we're dropping them off, so I can make contact with some clients while we're planet-side," Inara mutters, heading up the stairs to her shuttle. She casts a smile at River as she passes the dancing girl.

"Preacher, you on K.P. duty with me?" asks Zoe after a nod to Mal. Shepherd nods and joins her, heading up to the dining area, and Kaylee follows with Simon, his arms crossed and a hint of a disappointed scowl on his face.

"You should listen to him," says River softly, glancing down at Jayne and Mal at a pause in her dance. "People should age. Time... time makes lines, laugh lines and frown lines. Maybe they never laugh or frown. Maybe they're bored with life and have forgotten how."

"Aw, you're not takin' 'im seriously, are you, Capt'n?" scoffs Jayne, watching River wander away towards the dining room. "Never heard such nonsense. Man lookin' the same after fifteen years of hard livin' on the rim? Ain't possible."

"No. No, it's ain't," Mal whispers, lips tight in a frustrated frown, creating plenty of lines on his own face. "But I'm gonna keep a sharp eye on 'em, just in case."

* * *

Spike rolls over, panting heavily. _Shouldn't feel the need to keep gaspin' like this, don't even need the air, and she'll laugh if she notices_. _Thinks it's petty of me, breathin' like a human..._

Beside him on the bed, Drusilla smiles in her sleep, her thirst quenched and her lust satisfied. She had drunk deeply tonight, siphoning his life-force until her appetite was sated, leaving him almost too weak to pleasure her.

His breaths finally slowing, Spike presses a gentle kiss to her forehead before dropping his head back on the pillow and running his fingertips over the bite on his neck. His blood is potent enough to keep his lover from wasting away, but the drain to his own strength is building up. Too much more, and he'll start getting clumsy, perhaps to the point where his capricious partner gets out of hand, like at Whitefall...

Well, he just won't let that happen. It's a simple solution, after all. Tomorrow night... they'll both drink.

* * *

_To be continued..._

_A/N: In case you were curious, Kaylee called Jayne a "húndàn", meaning 'bastard' or 'asshole'. Jayne uses it in Ep 1 "Serenity" and in Ep 3 "Bushwhacked". Maybe it's a little harsh for Kaylee, but I used what I could find. The next chapter will hopefully be hi-larious, so stay tuned!_


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